Amazon RDS vs Google Cloud SQL comparison

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Google are both solutions in the Database as a Service (DBaaS) category. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.4, while Google is ranked #6 with an average rating of 7.8. Amazon Web Services (AWS) holds a 14.8% mindshare in DS, compared to Google’s 8.5% mindshare. Additionally, 98% of Amazon Web Services (AWS) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Google users who would recommend it.

Amazon RDS

Read 58 Amazon RDS reviews

3,594 Views
3,486 Comparison Views

98% willing to recommend

Google Cloud SQL

Read 23 Google Cloud SQL reviews

1,988 Views
1,968 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Amazon RDS

Google Cloud SQL

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 2, 2025

Amazon RDS and Google Cloud SQL are competitive products in the database as a service category. Amazon RDS appears to have the upper hand with robust features and reliability, while Google Cloud SQL excels in cost efficiency and ease of management.

Features: Amazon RDS offers support for a wide range of databases, automated management, and high availability, enhancing microservices architecture integration. It also provides scalability and performance optimization across multiple engines. Google Cloud SQL ensures robust data safety with redundancy options and offers automated scaling, minimizing operational concerns. It focuses on flexible customization potential but covers fewer on-premises enterprise features than RDS.

Room for Improvement: Amazon RDS users encounter migration challenges and limited shell access, hindering deep database management. Some features could be enabled by default for user convenience. Google Cloud SQL requires enhancement in supporting high I/O operations and improving documentation clarity. Better integration and analytics capabilities would strengthen its competitive position.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Both Amazon RDS and Google Cloud SQL offer flexible deployment, accommodating public and hybrid cloud environments. Google Cloud SQL is notable for its user-friendly interface, while Amazon RDS receives mixed feedback on customer support quality, necessitating improvement in response times and support quality. Both services provide substantial documentation, although RDS charges additional support fees unless on premium plans.

Pricing and ROI: Amazon RDS is regarded as expensive but valuable, with potential ROI from reduced DBA workloads. Careful resource provisioning aids in managing costs. Google Cloud SQL is typically more affordable, aligning with industry standards, though additional costs arise from backup and replication requirements. Its predictable pricing model often leads to quicker ROI, aided by reduced management resource expenses.

To learn more, read our detailed Amazon RDS vs. Google Cloud SQL Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Amazon RDS vs. Google Cloud SQL

December 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 879,768 peers since 2012

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

Amazon RDS

Ranking in Database as a Service (DBaaS)

2nd

Ranking in Relational Databases Tools

9th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Google Cloud SQL

Ranking in Database as a Service (DBaaS)

6th

Ranking in Relational Databases Tools

19th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Database Management Systems (DBMS) (6th)

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Database as a Service (DBaaS) category, the mindshare of Amazon RDS is 14.8%, down from 25.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Google Cloud SQL is 8.5%, down from 16.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Database as a Service (DBaaS) Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Amazon RDS	14.8%
Google Cloud SQL	8.5%
Other	76.7%

Database as a Service (DBaaS)

Featured Reviews

reviewer2592669

Director Software Engineer at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees

Positive experiences with database services, with minor room for feature enhancements observed

I don't really see any disadvantages of Amazon RDS. With Oracle, I think AWS doesn't provide the RAC stability. If you have Oracle installed in your own data centers, you can set up various clusters and we can set up the RACs, but in Amazon RDS, we cannot have the RAC feature of Oracle. They could add that feature. Amazon RDS has limitations regarding RAC. If we talk about installing Oracle in RDS, we cannot have the RAC, but if you deploy Oracle on GCP, then there is probably the RAC feature available. I observed that around two or three years back, but I'm not sure whether they have added the RAC feature in AWS. Amazon RDS is expensive compared to GCP. GCP also has the same features, and although it is quite extensive and feature-rich, I see Amazon RDS as slightly expensive compared to other clouds.

Read full review

Prathap Sankar

Analytics Delivery Manager at Tredence Inc.

Gain control and flexibility with customizable tools but has slower performance

I am majorly working in Google Cloud SQL for building my applications Google Cloud SQL provides complete customization options, along with a dashboarding tool and a comprehensive suite of tools that can be used to customize and build any application needed. The deployment model allows for…

Read full review

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"One of the most valuable features is that it is serverless, so we don't have to worry about scaling."

"Amazon RDS provides data encryption using services like KMS, crucial for securing high-sensitive data and meeting compliance requirements such as HIPAA or PCI DSS."

"I use Amazon RDS to store and manage data securely. It helps me retrieve information and gain insights from the data that comes in for my business or specific applications."

"The initial setup is straightforward, and technical support is good."

"The most valuable feature is that it is a fully managed database, where they handle most of the administrative tasks and leaves the users more time to concentrate on business."

"It is stable, scalable, and easy to deploy."

"Amazon RDS is easy to manage, and it has customizable performance, high availability, and duality."

"The product's installation phase is easy."

More Amazon RDS pros

"From a database management perspective, it provides services without the need for me to worry about backups, scaling, or other operational issues."

"The valuable feature of Google Cloud SQL is its high availability option. The product is stable."

"My suggestion to anyone thinking about this solution is to jump into it head-first!"

"I found its storage and security to be the most valuable. It was a good experience. It is also very stable and scalable, and its support is perfect."

"Google Cloud SQL is easy to start with and allows me to scale as needed, which is advantageous from a developer perspective."

"Its most valuable feature is that it's scalable. I can start off with a base of a lot of data and move as much as I want and it's the same as if asked to do a lot of infrastructure changes."

"The implementation part of the product was easy."

"Google Cloud SQL is highly scalable."

More Google Cloud SQL pros

Cons

"Amazon RDS should have a more user-friendly graphical user interface and include better database management options."

"It would be helpful if they made it easier to migrate from an existing on-premises solution to the cloud-based service."

"User interface needs improvement for using IPS and CloudWatch to scale and utilize read replicas, enabling performance insights to view query formats where the bottlenecks occur, identifying the fixes, slow queries, and missing indexes, improving the security and monitoring with alerts."

"The backup and restore processes take more time compared to other providers. For instance, if DigitalOcean takes two minutes to restore or create a backup, AWS will take 2 to 3 minutes."

"There are a few aspects of database management that have room for improvement. There are a few parameters in the solution that are a bit unclear at our end as it's not understandable."

"The only thing that needs improvement would be the pricing of the solution."

"Amazon RDS could improve by having more sophisticated. I use other solutions that have better technology for more difficult tasks."

"The security features could be improved."

More Amazon RDS cons

"When discussing media files, such as images and audio files, stored in Google Cloud, concerns about handling large amounts of data arise."

"The product's user interface could be more user-friendly to improve the overall user experience."

"The purging of the data could be better."

"Sometimes the sharing with third parties or configuring that in Google Cloud SQL is not the most intuitive."

"I would appreciate more flexibility with specific extensions applicable to engines like PostgreSQL."

"It is hard to do logging with the solution."

"I would appreciate more flexibility with specific extensions applicable to engines like PostgreSQL. This would enhance the capabilities of Google Cloud SQL."

"The most vulnerable problem with Google SQL is that while you can customize your access control list, it provides you with a public IP address."

More Google Cloud SQL cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The platform pricing is on the higher side, but given its capabilities and ease of use, it remains competitive."

"The solution is fairly priced."

"Amazon RDS could improve by reducing the price."

"The solution is expensive."

"The price of Amazon RDS is expensive."

"On a scale from one to ten, where ten is the most expensive, and one is the cheapest, I rate the solution's pricing a seven out of ten."

"AWS is becoming pretty expensive because cheap or absolutely free services have become paid services. Amazon RDS is not an expensive product, but Amazon's ecosystem is becoming increasingly expensive."

"In my case, MySQL is free, and if there are any costs, then it is much less than other solutions since all such things usually come bundled with the hardware."

More Amazon RDS pricing and cost advice

"You need to pay extra costs for backup and replication."

"It's really cheap. It wouldn't be more than, I believe it's around 50 euro per month for running a cloud SQL."

"It is not expensive, especially considering the significant reduction in database management time."

"The solution is affordable."

"From a financial perspective, Google Cloud SQL is on the cheaper side."

"The pricing is very much an important factor as to why we use this solution."

"While the platform’s pricing may be higher, it aligns with industry standards, considering the quality of service and features provided."

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Database as a Service (DBaaS) solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

879,768 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

13%

Financial Services Firm

11%

University

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

14%

Computer Software Company

13%

Educational Organization

University

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	22
Midsize Enterprise	15
Large Enterprise	23

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	9
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	9

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Amazon RDS?

The product's installation phase is easy.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Amazon RDS?

The pricing for Amazon RDS is reasonable.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Amazon RDS?

Currently, I cannot think of any major improvements. Perhaps more platforms in terms of database engine versions would be beneficial. Right now, Amazon RDS supports MySQL and PostgreSQL, but there ...

See all answers

What do you like most about Google Cloud SQL?

The implementation part of the product was easy.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Google Cloud SQL?

We have set up automated patch management for Google Cloud SQL, and it does on a daily basis what needs to be done, so it is pretty good overall for maintaining our database security.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Google Cloud SQL?

Sometimes the sharing with third parties or configuring that in Google Cloud SQL is not the most intuitive. From a user perspective, if Google Cloud SQL integrated AI directly into the query so tha...

See all answers

Comparisons

MongoDB Atlas vs Amazon RDS

Compared 20% of the time

Microsoft Azure SQL Database vs Amazon RDS

Compared 14% of the time

Oracle Database as a Service vs Amazon RDS

Compared 12% of the time

Oracle Exadata Cloud at Customer vs Amazon RDS

Compared 5% of the time

Google Cloud Spanner vs Amazon RDS

Compared 5% of the time

More Amazon RDS Competitors

Microsoft Azure SQL Database vs Google Cloud SQL

Compared 31% of the time

MongoDB Atlas vs Google Cloud SQL

Compared 15% of the time

Oracle Database as a Service vs Google Cloud SQL

Compared 6% of the time

Google Cloud Spanner vs Google Cloud SQL

Compared 5% of the time

Oracle Exadata Cloud at Customer vs Google Cloud SQL

Compared 4% of the time

More Google Cloud SQL Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Amazon RDS

January 2026

Download Amazon RDS product report

Buyer's Guide

Google Cloud SQL

December 2025

Download Google Cloud SQL product report

Also Known As

RDS

No data available

Overview

Amazon Relational Database Service (Amazon RDS) is a web service that makes it easier to set up, operate, and scale a relational database in the cloud. It provides cost-efficient, resizeable capacity for an industry-standard relational database and manages common database administration tasks.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Google Cloud SQL is a fully-managed database service that makes it easy to set up, maintain, manage, and administer your relational PostgreSQL and MySQL databases in the cloud. Google Cloud SQL offers high performance, scalability, and convenience. Hosted on Google Cloud Platform, Cloud SQL provides a database infrastructure for applications running anywhere.

Google

Sample Customers

Edmodo

BeDataDriven, CodeFutures, Daffodil, GenieConnect, KiSSFLOW, LiveHive, SulAm_rica, Zync

Buyer's Guide

Amazon RDS vs. Google Cloud SQL

December 2025

Free Report: Amazon RDS vs. Google Cloud SQL

Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon RDS vs. Google Cloud SQL and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.

DOWNLOAD NOW

879,768 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our Amazon RDS vs. Google Cloud SQL report.

See our list of best Database as a Service (DBaaS) vendors and best Relational Databases Tools vendors.

We monitor all Database as a Service (DBaaS) reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.